Career Advice from 5 Powerful Silicon Valley Women

Change Is Underway

My mom is famous for her “What glass ceiling?” stance. “There’s only a barrier to success if you acknowledge one,” she’d tell me (or something like that). While many would argue that there’s more to it than that, the great thing about the tech world is that you can start a company and, as long as your idea works, it can just as quickly become uber-successful regardless of if you’re a man or woman.

Forbes published some ideas on how to promote female advancement in tech and other STEM fields, which is worth a read. In the meantime, though, I’m grateful these women have paved the way and shown us what can be done.

A writer, artist, and designer since she was young enough to put pencil to paper, Hilary taught herself code and created Urbanette when she was a teenager. Currently, she lives in Monte Carlo, but spent the past decade living in NYC, still considers herself a New Yorker, and visits regularly. She's always traveling, looking for hot new topics, destinations, and life hacks to bring to Urbanette readers.

There are companies who support women no matter what. You just have to find the right company that fits all your ideals. I know that this can be hard because work is work and career is career, but when you’re not in the right place, you won’t bloom because your roots won’t reach deep and you won’t be as strong. Choose the perfect place for you to be “planted”. Women are strong and even back in the days, we’ve always been capable of so many things.

In life, you can’t be ready. I also think that if it doesn’t scare you, it won’t help you grow. Life is all about making big decisions and making crazy ones that are out of your comfort zone. If you’re always living by the rules and all you do is do whatever everyone expects you to do, you are being mediocre. You will never stand out and you will never achieve anything beyond your dreams. Not to offend anyone but that’s the truth. We have to do more in order to achieve more.